1. Field of the Invention
The present invention provides an integrated analytical biochip and manufacturing method thereof, whereby utilizing the micro electromechanical system process for forming a Polymerase Chain Reaction (“PCR”) micro-reaction tank, capillary electrophoresis (“CE”) channels and a set of optic fiber structures on a biochip, and at the same time producing a micro temperature detector, a micro heater and an electrode for integrating with an IC controller, such that an integrated biological detection and analysis system can be formed on the same biochip.
2. Description of the Related Art
The method of utilizing PCR to clone all kinds of DNAs has already been widely applied during pre-processing procedures in biomedical detection, and the sensitivity of biomedical detection can be increased by the quantity amplified from cloning. The traditional PCR thermal cycler is operated by placing samples contained in plastic tubes into a large PCR thermal cycler for producing specific number of cycles with specific temperatures and periods of time, such that a huge quantity of DNAs can be cloned and subsequent detection can be proceeded, thus increasing the distinguishability of the biomedical detection. Yet since huge quantity of samples is required, time spent would usually be more than three hours; in contrast, the micro biomedical chip produced via MEMS process may improve the foregoing drawbacks.
It is the current trend for developing biochips to integrate the pre-detection processing mechanisms into biochips, a design that not only lowers the processing costs and decreases time spent during pre-processing procedures, but also significantly lowers the quantity of samples consumed. However, regarding reaction tanks with volume thereof less than 1 μL, it is quite a challenge to try to manufacture micro temperature control system with lower production costs, lower energy consumption, simpler manufacturing processes, higher efficiency for raising and lowering temperatures and better temperature stabilization, simply because silicon chips used in semiconductor manufacturing processes are not biologically compatible, thus time-consuming and expensive manufacturing processes have to be employed for deposition and etching. Also the temperature detector placed at the exterior of the reaction tank and the heater would cause tremendous heat inertia, such that the values obtained by the temperature detector would not be the actual temperature of the reaction sample. Furthermore, with the blocking of the reaction tank walls, the temperature gradient between the heater and the sample is caused, thus rendering the system unable to provide immediate and precise temperature control.
The conventional PCR post-processing detection method consists of steps that first retrieve the cloned DNA sample and inject the Capillary Electrophoresis (“CE”) (or other detection device), so as to separate the DNA and proceed to signal measurement and detection. Yet as the quantity of PCR samples decreases to under 1 μL, the repetitious actions of injecting and retrieving would cause the decrease of the quantity of PCR samples, thus adversely affecting the detection results. Therefore it is definitely necessary to integrate the PCR and the CE on the same biochip.
Also, regarding the sample detection, the conventional optical detection method causes inconveniencies as follows:    1. The alignment in the process of the optical detection is extremely complicated and time-consuming;    2. The laser source needs to be positioned, a process that is difficult and time-consuming; and    3. The conventional optical detection device is complicated and cumbersome.
Based upon the inconveniencies mentioned above, the production costs of the conventional optical detection device are too high to proceed to commercial mass production.
Therefore, in view of various drawbacks caused by the conventional DNA sample detection and analysis methods, it is thus crucial as to how a biochip may integrate a PCR reaction tank, a CE and an optical detection system.